sensei

Araw'y dumampi...
O, kayganda ng araw
Ngayong tag-araw!

- Fermin Salvador (2007)

Here's my first Japanese language sensei or teacher, Tajima Aya, in the secret bonsai garden of my university.

The plants here enjoy perfect weather nearly everyday and cheerfully spread their branches like a rainbow, like many typical deep-rooted trees in the tropics. They are cared for by internationally-renowned master Modesto Manglicmot, Javi's sensei in bonsai.

kapayapaan

Sa paglabas noong nakaraang linggo ng desisyon ng Korte Suprema tungkol sa draft na kasunduan ng gobyerno at MILF, maraming nagtatanong kung paano muling maisususulong ang prosesong pangkapayapaan sa Mindanao. Mahalaga ito para sa patuloy na pag-unlad ng ekonomiya at pagkamit ng seguridad, lalo na ng 2 milyong taong nawalan ng tirahan dahil sa labanan.

Isa sa mga bansang maaari nating tingnan bilang modelo ang Indonesia, na natamo ang kapayapaan sa teritoryong Aceh pagkatapos ng 29 na taong pakikibaka ng Kilusang Pangkalayaan ng Aceh (GAM). Tulad sa Mindanao, sinasabing nagmula ang tunggaliang Aceh sa kasaysayan, relihiyon, at di makatarungang alokasyon ng mga likas na yaman.

Nabigyang solusyon ang kapayapaan sa Aceh sa tulong ng Crisis Management Initiative, sa pamumuno ni Marti Ahtisaari, dating Pangulo ng Finland na siyang ginawaran ng Gantimpalang Nobel para sa Kapayapaan ngayong taon.

Nasa larawan sa itaas ang aking unang kaibigang Fino na si Ville Niinistö sa Hardin ng Ganap na Kaningningan sa Tsina, bago siya nahalal na Miyembro ng Batasang-Bayan ng Finland.

  

Salamat kina Tiina Kaaresvirta at Petri Korpela sa kantang "Tulen Synty Loitsu."

tweethearts

The Philippines is so connected now, it's easy to forget the time when most people didn't have cellphones or email accounts. I myself got my first email account at the National Computer Center near the UP Sundial only in college: the software didn't produce any graphics, messages had a white angular font on a black background.

Back then, it was exotic news when a Collegian editor found a girlfriend or husband on-line. The romantic narrative, I thought, went something like this: two people meet face-to-face, they decide to have a long-distance relationship, they email each other and live happily ever after. Technology, however, has turned this narrative on its head: see this story of a marriage proposal on Twitter.

What's my Twitter love story?

Not much, LOL. A couple of weeks ago, I was reading the tweets of randomly chosen people. It's amazing how you can find out a lot about people from messages of 140 characters or less: the food they like, their interests, whether they're serious or witty. As news of the credit crunch spread like a wave each day, I slowly felt drawn to someone who lived in the other city by the bay. One tweet at a time, I remembered my friends and loved ones in the US and around the world: it's my hope that you will survive and rise above the challenges of these times. The end.

Here's a picture I took of street signs in San Francisco with the names of Filipino heroes Lapu-Lapu and Rizal.

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Thanks to Tony Bennett and Lee-Hom Wang for "If I Ruled the World," a song that expresses a vision of simplicity and joy that, I believe, is shared by many Filipinos.

integration

It's an exciting time for our doctors- as well as accountants and dentists- since Southeast Asian ministers recently signed agreements allowing them to practice in the entire ASEAN region.

The borders of nation-states in the ASEAN mainly follow those delineated by former colonial powers, despite the many similarities in our cultures. In pre-colonial times, the Kingdom of Namayan, with its royal capital in Sapa (later renamed Santa Ana, Manila), had ties of blood and marriage to the Madjapahit Empire. Had colonization not intervened, the development of nation-states in the region might have turned out differently. Today, ASEAN is a market of about 550 million people with a gross regional product of US$1.1 trillion and total trade of US$1.6 trillion.

Here are our future doctors viewed from inside the ribcage of a skeleton during a recent anatomy exam in the U.P. College of Medicine. I took this in the course of doing research for the biography of Dr. George Eufemio, president of Philippine Cancer Society. U.P. is known for producing world-class physicians. Later on, the Philippines might sign similar agreements with countries in other regions, like the E.U., but it's only prudent that we begin with neighbors which have a history, culture and economy similar to ours.